Pain management is critical part of caring for a patient. Local anesthetics are routinely utilized to treat pain either on a daily basis as part of a routine pain management program for ailments such as but not limited to lower back pain, or for temporarily blocking the nerve impulses in an area where an incision or puncturing of the skin needs to be made. The delivery of local anesthetics such as lidocaine through the skin has many advantages. One advantage is that transdermal delivery of medication is very convenient and non-invasive for the patient. Oral application of such drugs must take into account different metabolism and absorption rates subsequent ingestion. Transdermal delivery further has shown to offer a high degree of control over blood concentrations of the delivered drug thus greatly increasing the safety of the delivery.
Routinely in the health management of a patient, injectable medicines must be administered to treat the symptoms or illness of the patient. The medicine is routinely injected in an area of the body where a muscle can be penetrated by the administrator of the injection. Most patients possess fear and anxiety of receiving an injection/puncture. Patients ranging from pediatric to geriatic have fear and/or anxiety regarding the pain associated with receiving an injection/puncture or puncturing of the skin by a needle. This presents challenges for the healthcare worker as they attempt to coerce or distract the patient from the process of administering the injection/puncture. Currently, the normal preparatory process for the injection/puncture site only involves an antiseptic wipe such as but not limited to an alcohol wipe in order to substantially prevent infections. One problem with current administration of an injection or diagnostic procedure requiring the skin of a patient to be punctured is that the process does not involve any application of topical local anesthetics for those patients that may be experiencing significant anxiety about receiving an injection/puncture. The use of topical anesthetics does not occur for several reasons. First, readily available applicators such as transdermal patches are not routinely made available that are suitable to apply the correct dosage of topical anesthetic required to numb an injection/puncture site. Another issue with transdermal applicators of topical anesthetic is that current transdermal applicators offer no method of indication as to whether or not the applicator has been in place for a sufficient amount of time such that the topical anesthetic has been absorbed and the area is now ready for an injection or puncturing of the skin.
Accordingly, there is a need for a transdermal applicator containing a topical anesthetic that is of suitable size to prepare an injection/puncture site on a patient's body and wherein the transdermal applicator provides a visual signal to the healthcare worker subsequent the transdermal applicator having been applied for a sufficient amount of time for the topical anesthetic to have been absorbed into the skin of the patient. Additionally, the transdermal anesthetic applicator should function to substantially decrease the risk of non-compliance for patients that are required to self-administer any injectable medication or puncture their skin as part of a diagnostic procedure by substantially reducing the fear/discomfort associated therewith.